Three Health Benefits of Triathlon Training

“Oh no, are we out?” I
asked my wife after I got home from a run. “Yes,” she said. “OK. I will be
back.” I sprinted out again, this time to my car to speed to the grocery store
and buy three packs of Hershey’s Chocolate Bars. Why? Because I like them.
Like, REALLY like them. As I stood in the checkout line waiting for what seemed
like forever, I found my attention zeroing in on a copy of Men’s Health magazine.
There is nothing like a picture of a ripped, healthy looking dude next to the
words “27 ways to get healthier” to make you feel a little guilty about going
to the store to buy three packs of chocolate bars.

Shoot, I thought. Am I unhealthy? I
generally think of myself as a healthy person. I do eat, on average, one
chocolate bar a day, but other than that I eat my vegetables, I rarely get
sick, I have the energy to do the things I want, I train daily, and I race
triathlons at a professional level.

As I savored the milky
richness of my chocolate bar on the way home, I pondered over the question some
more. If I am healthy, what makes me healthy? I always assumed that
triathlon made me healthy, but does it? I came to the realization that
health is made up of a whole lot of things that are constantly spinning through
time; things like genetics, nutrition, physical fitness background, physical
fitness ability, lifestyle choices, environment and even relationships. The one
way triathlon primarily impacts my health, however, is through physical
exercise. Exercise is fundamental to our success as triathletes. We exercise
and we exercise a lot compared to the average American. We need to exercise in
order to go as far and hard as we do on race day. When we exercise in an
intelligent way (i.e. train), our bodies adapt to the stress. They become
stronger and more resilient. In turn, we get healthy side effects such as a
stronger heart or more efficient lungs.

Now, I am certainly
not oblivious to the fact that triathlon training and racing can negatively
impact your health due to things like overtraining, overuse of specific tissues
or simply pushing the body too hard in hostile conditions. Athletes hire me as
a coach, in part, to help them avoid these things. With that said, triathlon is
a healthy sport to participate in due to its positive impact on our
cardiovascular health, brain health and bone health.

1. Triathlon Training
Promotes Cardiovascular Health

A good working
cardiovascular system is essential to our health. Our arteries are the blood
vessels that take blood away from the heart and toward the muscles. It is very
important for the arteries to work properly so they can bring nutrient-rich
blood to our organs. When we are young, our arteries are elastic, flexible and
open. As we age, however, our arteries become thick and stiff. Through a
process called atherosclerosis, the arteries become blocked up with a substance
called plaque. This plaque is the buildup of fats such as cholesterol, triglycerides
and phospholipids. Plaque restricts blood flow to organs in the body,
contributing to heart disease, which, according to the Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention, is the leading cause of death in the United States
(National Center for Health Statistics, 2016).

In triathlon, we do a
substantial amount of training to support our racing. One major benefit of this
training is that it staves off atherosclerosis by preventing and, in some
cases, reversing plaque buildup. This works because of how exercise impacts the
number of little carriers that deposit fat and remove it from our cells. These
carriers are called lipoproteins. There are the low density lipoproteins (LDL),
also known as “bad cholesterol,” which deposit fat into our cells. There are
also the high density lipoproteins (HDL), known as “good cholesterol,” which
remove fat from our cells. LDL can attach and deposit fat into the arterial
walls creating plaque while HDL can remove the plaque from arterial walls. When
we exercise as much as we do to prepare for triathlon, LDL levels decrease and
HDL levels increase. The fat carried by the HDL is taken to the liver and
repurposed. Ultimately, this process helps us maintain our arteries. Although
our triathlon training does not necessarily make us immune to atherosclerosis,
it helps to slow the process and sustain normal blood flow to organs like the
heart and brain.

2. Triathlon Promotes Brain
Health

The same exercise that
helps us maintain good arterial health also supports our brain. When we exercise,
studies show that the body increases blood flow to the brain, which contributes
to positive structural and functional changes.

A study in Physiology looked
into the impact of physical activity on adult rat hippocampal neurogenesis
(AHN) or, more simply, the creation of brain cells in the area of the brain
associated with memory and higher thinking skills. Researchers tested three
groups of rats, modifying their exercise program. The researchers compared a
control group of sedentary rats to a group that did high intensity intervals
and another group that did aerobic training. The scientists found that where
there was no significant change of ANH in the sedentary rats, the high
intensity trained rats showed a modest increase, and the aerobically trained rats
showed the most significant increase. This suggests that the aerobic training
we do as triathletes could possibly increase brain cell numbers and improve our
ability to think.

Two other studies, both using human subjects,
found that physical exercise is associated with improved white matter
integrity. White matter is responsible for the speed, coordination and
connections between parts of the brain and the rest of the body. Breakdown of
white matter has been shown to be associated with diseases such as multiple
sclerosis and Alzheimer’s (Bergland, 2014). Another study found that aerobic
activity improved white matter integrity in active children between the ages of
9-10 (Chaddock-Heyman et al., 2014), while Zu et al (2014) found that aerobic
activity improved integrity in “low fit” participants ages 60-78. Regardless of
the age we begin training, the aerobic training we do to prepare for triathlon
can help improve the structure of our brains.

Another study looked
at changes in brain function by using the long-term data of a human study
called Coronary Risk Development in Young Adults (Neurology, Burzynska
et al., 2014). In the 1980s, participants did a treadmill test to exhaustion.
The same participants repeated the test roughly 30 years later and followed it
up with cognitive testing. This cognitive testing required them to remember
lists of words and distinguish colors from text. The results showed that those
who were fitter at a young age performed better on the cognitive tests later
compared to those who were less fit at an early age. This is, perhaps, the most
convincing study that suggests that the fitness that we build through
triathlon, especially if we start early, can actually improve our memory when
we are older.

3. Triathlon Promotes Bone
Health

A third way that
triathlon supports our physical health is by helping us build strong bones. Our
bones are constantly remodeling themselves, which means they are continuously
breaking down and building back up. When we are young, the body builds bone quickly,
which leads us to have strong, dense bones. As we age, bone replacement slows
and osteoporosis, the process where bone replacement is slower than bone
removal, can occur. In fact, one in two women and one in four men over the age
of 50 will end up getting osteoporosis fractures (Lawrence, 2011).

One way to prevent low bone density is by
doing load bearing exercises like the strength training and running that we do
to prepare for our triathlons. In their review, Layne and Nelson (1999) show
that the majority of studies on load bearing exercises and bone health create
denser bones and prevent fractures. Lifting weights is likely the best exercise
for building bones and we can add this into our training once or twice a week.
Just as exercise does not necessarily prevent the occurrence of
atherosclerosis, weight bearing exercise does not necessarily prevent
osteoporosis; however, if we eat nutrient-rich foods and do weight bearing
exercises, we can help lower our risk of disease.

One thing that sets triathlon apart from other
sports is that it has both weight bearing and non-weight bearing components.
While other sports such as running or basketball require you to put force on
your bones almost all the time, triathlon does not put as much stress on the
bones since the training is divided between swimming (non-weight bearing),
biking (non-weight bearing) and running (weight bearing). On the other side of
things, triathlon training improves bone density unlike sports that are
primarily non-weight bearing such as swimming or cycling. On top of this, if an
injury that could lead to a stress fracture occurs, triathletes can modify
their training by decreasing the volume of running and increasing the volume of
swimming and/or biking. This keeps the athlete engaged and contrasts to other
primarily weight bearing sports that might require the athlete to take time off
from their sport.

A Final Note

Too often, I see people in the gym trying to
get healthy and waging a war against their body to do it. I see them pounding
out miles on the treadmill and limiting their calorie intake. They clearly hate
every minute of it. One great thing about sport is that it can refocus your
mindset. You come to your workouts with a purpose that goes well beyond
improving your health. You work out in order to master a set of skills like
ascending a hill or improving your catch to help you reach your goals. The
focus toward mastering skills and improving performance holds our attention
much longer and is more fun than working out for the sake of being healthy.
Further, when you train as an athlete you begin to look at your body not as an
enemy but as a tool. You listen to it and it teaches you what is healthy. You
start to understand that it needs fuel, sometimes even Hershey’s Chocolate, in
order to energize your workouts. You learn that it needs a certain amount of
rest so that you can continue to improve. And when you don’t fuel your body
well or give it enough rest, your body lets you know.

When we focus our eyes on sport, good health
becomes a byproduct. This does not give you a pass to disregard your yearly
checkup with your doctor or to avoid all fruits and vegetables because you can
get by on just white bread; however, the great thing about triathlon is that,
when you train consistently, you will improve your cardiovascular health, your
brain health, your bone health and many other aspects of your health without
really thinking about it.Looking for a coach? Jon Fecik races as a professional triathlete,
is a USA Triathlon Level I Certified Coach, and works for Complete Human
Performance. He guides a vast spectrum of age-groupers, from those who finished
their first sprint triathlon to those who qualified for and competed at
Nationals, Worlds, 70.3 Worlds and the IRONMAN World Championship. Follow Jon
on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.